Buy New Textbook

The Jesuit Relations is a massive, 73-volume library of French Jesuit missionaries' perspectives on Native North America in the 17th century. Due to the vastness of the collection, these documents, vitally important in telling the story of early American encounters, have been virtually unteachable until now. Allen Greer deftly binds them into a collection, and his introduction provides background on these Jesuits, the Natives, and their co-habitation in early North America. Greer has created a rich resource of journal entries by famous missionaries as well as a wealth of natural history, ethnographic detail, and travel diction through firsthand accounts of early American history.

ALLAN GREER is professor of history and vice principal of University College at the University of Toronto. Author of The People of New France (1997); The Patriots and the People: The Rebellion of 1837 in Rural Lower Canada (1993); Peasant, Lord and Merchant: Rural Society in Three Quebec Parishes 1740–1840 (1985), he is also the recipient of the John Porter Prize, the Prix Lionel-Groulx, the Sir John A. MacDonald Prize, and the Allan Sharlin Prize. He is currently working on a book on the seventeenth-century Mohawk "saint" Kateri Tekakwitha.

Foreword

iii

Preface

v

List of Maps and Illustrations

xiii

Introduction: Native North America and the French Jesuits

1

(2)

The Society of Jesus of Europe and Abroad

3

(3)

Iroquoians and Algonquians

6

(3)

The Colonization of New France

9

(2)

The Canadian Missions

11

(3)

The Jesuit Relations and Their Readers

14

(2)

Confronting the Other: The Problem of Cultural and Historical Difference

16

(4)

Montagnais Hunters of the Northern Woodlands

20

(17)

Paul Le Jeune Winters with Mestigoit's Band, 1633--1634

21

(7)

Journal [of a Winter Hunt], 1634

23

(3)

Paul Le Jeune

On Their Hunting and Fishing, 1634

26

(2)

Paul Le Jeune

The Montagnais Described

28

(7)

On the Beliefs, Superstitions, and Errors of the Montagnais Indians, 1634

28

(4)

Paul Le Jeune

On the Good Things Which Are Found among the Indians, 1634

32

(3)

Paul Le Jeune

How to Settle Disputes and Discipline Children

35

(2)

What Occurred in New France in the Year 1633, 1633

36

(1)

Paul Le Jeune

Jean de Brebeuf on the Hurons

37

(33)

Language

38

(3)

Of the Language of the Hurons, 1636

38

(3)

Jean de Brebeuf

Religion, Myth, Ritual

41

(9)

What the Hurons Think about Their Origin, 1636

41

(5)

Jean de Brebeuf

That the Hurons Recognize Some Divinity; Of Their Superstitions and of Their Faith in Dreams, 1636

46

(2)

Jean de Brebeuf

Concerning Feasts, Dances...and What They Call Ononharoia, 1636

48

(2)

Jean de Brebeuf

Law and Government

50

(11)

Of the Polity of the Hurons and of Their Government, 1636

51

(8)

Jean de Brebeuf

Of the Order the Hurons Observe in Their Councils, 1636

59

(2)

Jean de Brebeuf

The Huron Feast of the Dead

61

(9)

Of the Solemn Feast of the Dead, 1636

61

(9)

Jean de Brebeuf

Disease and Medicine

70

(24)

Huron Medical Practices

72

(6)

[Cure by Lacrosse], 1636

72

(1)

Jean de Brebeuf

[Cure by Gambling], 1639

73

(2)

Jerome Lalemant

[Satisfying the Soul's Desires], 1639

75

(3)

Jerome Lalemant

The Influenza Epidemic of 1637

78

(11)

The Malady with Which Our Little Household Has Been Afflicted, 1637

79

(2)

Francois Le Mercier

The Help We Have Given to the Sick of Our Village, 1637

81

(1)

Francois Le Mercier

Ossossane Afflicted with the Contagion, 1637

82

(7)

Francois Le Mercier

Of the Hurons Baptized This Year, 1638, 1638

89

(1)

Francois Le Mercier

Smallpox among the Hurons, 1639

89

(2)

Of the Persecutions Excited against Us, 1640

90

(1)

Jerome Lalemant

A Medical Duel: Father Allouez and the Potawotamis

91

(3)

Of the Mission to the Potawotamis, 1666--1667

92

(2)

Claude Allouez

Diplomacy and War

94

(25)

Peace Negotiations at Three Rivers, 1645

95

(11)

Treaty of Peace between the French, Iroquois, and Other Nations, 1644--1645

96

(10)

Barthelemy Vimont

Iroquois Attacks on the Algonquins, 1647

106

(5)

Some Iroquois Surprised after Defeating the Algonquins; A Woman Kills an Iroquois and Escapes, 1647

106

(5)

Jerome Lalemant

The Hurons Annihilated, 1649

111

(8)

Of the Capture of the Villages of the Missior of St. Ignace, in the Month of March of the Year 1649, 1648--1649

112

(7)

Paul Ragueneau

Writings on the Natural Environment

119

(17)

Montagnais Explanations of a Solar Eclipse

119

(3)

Of Their Customs and Their Belief, 1637

120

(2)

Paul Le Jeune

The Moral Qualities of Animals

122

(1)

Various Matters, 1647--1648

122

(1)

Jerome Lalemant

Earthquakes, Comets, and Other Prophetic Signs

123

(9)

Three Suns and Other Aerial Phenomena Which Appeared in New France, 1662--1663

124

(2)

Jerome Lalemant

Universal Earthquake in Canada and Its Marvelous Effects, 1662--1663

126

(5)

Jerome Lalemant

Of the Comets and Extraordinary Signs That Have Appeared at Quebec and in Its Vicinity, 1664-1665

131

(1)

Francois Le Mercier

Nature as a Storehouse of Resources

132

(4)

Of the Condition of Canada over the Last Two Years, 1666-1667

132

(4)

Francois Le Mercier

Missions to the Iroquois

136

(19)

Mission to the Mohawk Country, 1667

137

(3)

Of the Mission of Ste. Marie among the Mohawk Iroquois, 1667--1668

137

(3)

Francois Le Mercier

The Mohawks Converted

140

(6)

Of the Mission of the Martyrs in the Country of the Mohawks, or the Lower Iroquois, 1669--1670

141

(5)

Jean Pierron

The Iroquois Mission of Sault St. Louis/Kahnawake

146

(9)

Letter of October 14, 1682, 1682

147

(8)

Claude Chauchetiere

Martyrs and Mystics

155

(31)

The Ordeal of Isaac Jogues

155

(16)

How Father Isaac Jogues Was Taken by the Iroquois, and What He Suffered on His First Entrance into Their Country, 1647

157

(14)

Jerome Lalemant

A Native Saint

171

(15)

Catherine Tagahkouita: An Iroquois Virgin, 1744

172

(14)

P. F. X. de Charlevoix

Exploring the Mississippi

186

(32)

On the First Voyage by Father Marquette toward New Mexico and How the Idea Was Conceived, 1674